'PERFECT SCORE' FAILS JUST ABOUT EVERY TEST.

Byline: Evan Henerson Staff Writer

SHARPEN UP those No. 2 pencils, boys and girls. It's time for a single- question, multiple-choice quiz.

Ready? Cool. Select the phrase that best applies to the ``Hey, gang, let's steal the SAT and learn a valuable lesson'' teen heist movie, ``The Perfect Score'':

A) It's the movie sensitive teen-meister John Hughes would have made had he been strapped to a bench, a knife at his throat, with a pulsating garage band score on continuous loop placed two inches from his eardrum.

B) It's the endeavor that will drive ``Pearl Earring'' and ``Lost in Translation'' lass Scarlett Johansson to ponder how to pull off her own perfect score: the systematic obliteration of every print in existence.

C) It's conclusive evidence that movie multiplexes should stock ibuprofen alongside their M&Ms.

D) It's proof that Portland Trail Blazer - and former L.A. Clipper - Darius Miles should, under no circumstances, quit his day job.

E) It's the movie that any human rights organizations targeting Asian- Americans will not want you to see.

F) All of the above.

This one requires half a brain cell. ``The Perfect Score'' gets an F. For its triteness and predictability. For its obnoxious score. For its waste of Johansson and, especially, for Leonardo Nam's ultra-offensive performance as a pot-smoking, computer-hacking slacker named Roy who makes ``Sixteen Candles' '' Long Duk Dong look like a United Nations ambassador.

There are, in fact, six high-schoolers who decide to break into the Educational Testing Services fortress to steal the master list of SAT questions. Some desperately need the answers because the fate of their college education - as decreed by their largely absent troglodyte parents - depends on it. Others are class screw-ups who simply crave the thrill of the heist.

Kyle (Chris Evans) has known since age 7 that he wants to be an architect, but his scores are too low to get him into Cornell. Class brain Anna (Erika Christensen) has scores too low for Brown. Kyle's best bud Matty (Bryan Greenberg) needs to get to the U of Maryland because that's where his girlfriend is. Blue-chip hoops phenom Desmond (Darius Miles) can slip into St. John's basketball program only with decent SAT numbers. Misfit Francesca (Johansson, sporting funky clothes and a nose stud) has a rich, bimbo-dating father whose job at ETS makes Francesca's participation a necessity, and pothead Roy wants in because he overheard Kyle and Matty hatching the plot.

Screenwriters Mark Schwahn, Marc Hyman and Jon Zack toss in a certain amount of blather about the unfairness of a standardized test as a yardstick for individuals. This is, apparently, supposed to up the moral ante of what our righteous rebels are trying to pull off, but the sentiments quickly get left behind. ``The Perfect Score'' feels especially false when it tries to display a brain or a conscience. Nor does it contain a single subversive bone in its entire flea-bitten body.

More often than not, director Brian Robbins (``Varsity Blues,'' ``Ready to Rumble'') is content to ramp up the soundtrack (a tune plays in the background of every scene), play around with character fantasies (Johansson gets to do a Neo on a couple of security guards) and play low-rent ``Mission: Impossible.'' The script is predictable enough to pair off the boys and girls in the most obvious combinations. And no loose ends here: Desmond has a strong no-nonsense mom (played by Tyra Ferrell). Roy's mom died when he was 9. Ergo ...

Ergo, Roy - who is also the narrator - ends up setting foot in someone's house other than his own. And any extra time spent in his company can be considered a very bad thing.

Evan Henerson, [phone]

evan.henerson(at)dailynews.com

THE PERFECT SCORE - half star

(PG-13: language, drug use, crude humor)

Starring: Erika Christensen, Chris Evans, Bryan Greenberg, Scarlett Johansson.

Director: Brian Robbins.

Running time: 1 hr. 37 min.

Playing: Citywide.

In a nutshell: Shallow and predictable. An undercooked ``Breakfast Club'' for a generation that should be smart enough to chose a different meal.